Should have on OC choice. Herman is available now /s
The Illinois Coaching Staff Search
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Al Washington d-line coach at ohio st dc material? And if we brought in a guy like English to the staff that’d be helpful experience for a first time dc like Washington. That a option? Idk I’m just thinking out loud. Would love Chris Ash but I figured that’d already happen by now if he wanted to be with BB at Illinois.
ChiefGritty
- Chicago, IL
So your contention is that Bret Bielema is a bottom of the barrel coach who is what we should expect at such a hopeless, garbage football program?
You cannot have it both ways here.
Depends on the staff. I thought you meant the program in general. I despise the BB hiring. But he may succeed.
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sacraig
- The desert
Sarkisian failed at USC because he is an alcoholic and hadn't yet sought treatment. He has now completed a treatment program and is presumably sober. He did a good job at Washington prior to that.
I don't know what you're talking about with Alabama, though. They're offense, which he calls, is prolific. They've dismantled everyone this year.
Deleted member 747671
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BB has made 2 hires. One iffy with no true connection. One good, with a strong connection and great potential. Let’s wait til he fills out his staff before deciding where in the barrel we fall? Our last staff had no dc, very little/no experience in P5, and HC’s buddies/kid.
Alabama's offense has an insane amount of talent with an offensive line who gives the skill position guys and QB time to excel. I think there's a number of play callers who could look good calling plays for them.
ChiefGritty
- Chicago, IL
Did he? He took over a program in bad shape and recruited really well, and quickly had them back up and running, and then failed to take that next step kinda over and over again over a 3-4 year span. They didn't live up to the talent level he brought in.
There were definitely doubters of him taking over at USC, but he's deeply tied with that program, he's a SoCal kid, he was recruiting the heck out of California, he brought a good staff along with him, there were a lot of reasons to think it was a fit.
He has none of that going to Texas. That is a viper pit and he's a stranger in a strange land. It feels like Armenian Charlie Strong to me.
Deleted member 747671
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This years offense was literally record setting. If you don’t think sark is a good, borderline great, offensive coach, I don’t know what to tell you.
Illinivek23
- Gurnee
I love this thread - anxious for but will be sad when the coaching staff is finalized - will need to move on with my life.
I didn't say that. I just said Alabama has incredible talent that a lot of play callers could have looked good coaching. They have two of four Heisman finalists and doesn't count their RB who looks like an absolute stud to me
Agreed. Alabama's talent even made Mike Locksley look like a good coach. Unless Texas can get Urban Meyer, I don't see why you fire Tom Herman. I don't think Sarkisian is better than him.
Most schools in Texas are crazy about their coaches. Look at Texas Tech. Fires Kliff Klingsbury, and then a couple weeks later he gets hired as head coach of an NFL team.
Serious question.....how would he have looked at Illinois last year calling plays for our offense?? Would he have been worth any extra wins?
Hard not to be good with Bama talent.
Not saying he isn’t a good coordinator......but player talent dictates so much.
ChiefGritty
- Chicago, IL
The thing about Bama is not so much the talent advantage as the culture of detail orientation and process mastery and internal discipline that Saban has built and obsessively maintained.
Lane Kiffin really revealed that I think. No one ever doubted Kiffin's brain for offensive football, he's been a prodigy since he was in his 20's. But he's been a self-saboteur everywhere he's been. But stick him in the Saban machine and it was only his talent as a coach that got applied to the situation with none of the baggage and he really transformed the way that program played.
What Sark has done with Mac Jones and DeVonta Smith, neither of whom was some dominant superstar when he took over, and honestly neither of whom was really groomed for the utter domination they've enjoyed, is an amazing feat of coaching. But he's done it as just the chalkboard guy at a program that takes the biggest high school stars and turns them into an 85+ man army platoon of maniacally, robotically disciplined and process-oriented football players. Sark didn't do that.
Rod Smith did a credible job here, and as I said above, it's mostly about the culture you build through your entire building which has been awful here forever and which Sark couldn't have fixed alone in a year. Still, I do feel like he would have been a much better fit with Peters and Bhebhe and yeah, I do think we'd have been a better offense if he were here, possibly much better.
We've been an offense at war with itself for Rod's whole time here.
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ChiefGritty
- Chicago, IL
Just a thought on Texas. Their bottomless money pit would be a way to square the circle of "how do we get Luke Fickell and Marcus Freeman on the same staff?"
That would be a better hire than Sark, IMO.
That would be a better hire than Sark, IMO.
Yeah, it's way too early to be tossing red flag talk out there. I'll be comfortable with whomever BB brings in. I think he knows how important these hires are.
Deleted member 747671
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Problem is that cincy actually has HC money. They’d pay Freeman more to stay than Texas would to be dc. Texas is crazy but 3-4 mil on a dc would be nother level crazy
I think Luke might be too smart for that. Though big money does have a way of making people not so smart.
sacraig
- The desert
A coach can still succeed in regions where they are new. Ultimately, it just means he needs some assistants that are good recruiters in the region and can get him acquainted.
ChiefGritty
- Chicago, IL
I really don't get Fickell's Skyline Chili Hamlet routine. Just take the Michigan State job you dork.
It really would have been a stroke of genius if we'd hired Freeman. He was on a couple of those first initial speculative lists by Jeremy Werner and the like and I immediately thought that was such a smart option to look at. The reason that's scary is the question of staff construction and management and being able to draw from a deep network of connections. WELP.
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Deleted member 747671
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Funny thing is, good chance he’d bring enos in as oc.
Deleted member 747671
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I think Freeman would be more for an uptempo offense and the oline and dc hires would be critical.
Deleted member 654622
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You are what your record says you are. Were bottom of the barrel.
If a coach chooses to go somewhere else, its not because of BB, its because were Illinois. Until we change history, it is what it is
skyIdub
Winged Warrior
It wasn't a 5 year failure when it was "fresh".
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